conferences

This past May, I attended the SoFabU OTR Brooklyn Conference. I share my personal experience and takeaways from the conference and a short, slideshow video that employs some useful hints and skills that I learned while there and in more detail below!

SoFabU OTR Brooklyn Conference

The Social Fabric University On The Road Brooklyn Conference was actually the first blogging conference that I have attended and I am so glad I did. At the time of this post, I have been blogging on Life’s Little Sweets since, March 2015, that’s 16 months and it’s gone by quickly and changed my life by enabling me to work from home, be true to my creativity and have fulfilling work that doesn’t always “seem” like work.

My Experience

When you are blogging, you can get in your own little world and it is so important to connect with people in person, in addition to online.

We had a chance to ask questions of the people that work at Social Fabric | Collective Bias which was amazing because I finally got a chance to meet, in person, these individuals that I had previously been communicating online, via e-mail, social media and in the Social Fabric community forum.

For those of you that do not know, Social Fabric | Collective Bias is one of the influencer networks that I belong to and it is one of the ways I get sponsored posts which help me earn income as a blogger. Sponsored posts are one of many diverse revenue streams that allows me to make this blog my full-time business. It is one of my favorite networks and I have had so many opportunities through them. You can see some examples of brands that I have worked with (via Social Fabric | Collective Bias/other influencer networks /directly) on my work with me page.

I met bloggers like Eileen from Everyday Eileen, I had known her before from Facebook groups and it was so nice to meet her in person!

We had 3 workshops, a couple Q & A sessions and chances to talk to other bloggers as well as put our skills into practice.

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It was only 1 day and it was a smaller-size conference which I felt was perfect for my first conference. I didn’t feel overwhelmed and it made me want to get out and attend more conferences in the future. Side note: They gave us some swag to take home and we were well fed all day which is important for a food-centric blogger like myself! 🙂

Below is a group photo, after the conference and during the reception. It originally appeared on the 3 Kids and a Fish‘s Instagram feedand I reposted it on my Instagram later.

Takeaways

I highly recommend attending one of these conferences if you are a blogger, I was able to put the new skills I learned there into practice right away and it helped me focus on my blog as my sustainable business. I left there feeling more empowered as a blogger and confident that I made the right choice in going down the “career blogger” path.

I think meeting successful bloggers and learning from people at all different levels and experiences awakened me to see that I can, in real life, do this. I know it sounds strange, but when you have your own business or are a soloprenuer/entreprenuer, being on your own for a while, you need to have an experience like that to keep going and get to the next level.

After SoFabU OTR Brooklyn, I am now “hooked” on attending conferences and will be looking for more to attend. I think I will start by looking for one close to my area (East Coast, USA) and go from there.

If you know of any that you really love, let me know in the comments, I would love to hear from other readers/bloggers experiences!

You can learn more about the past and upcoming2016 SoFabU OTR conferences here

Have you gone to any of the SoFabU conferences? What was your experience? What are your favorite blogging/food blog conferences? Do you have any questions about my experience at the conference? Let me know in the comments below!